Rain needles the Rusty Anchor windows. Dallas and Elena spread the ledger and marriage file across a sticky table, matching stamps, dates, and initials. The pattern is ugly, clean, and real, a whole city’s paperwork turned into a furnace.
Elena Vane
They are not just hiding people. They are deleting them. If you stay in Far Harbor too long, Dallas, they finish you on paper before they touch you in flesh.
Jackson steps in from the door, rain on his coat, face tight. He jerks his chin toward the street. Outside, a dark sedan idles through the curtain of weather, headlights off, waiting like it owns the night.
Jackson Temple
We got company. Not cops. Leave now, or they box us in.
Dallas Fontaine
The matching approvals run straight through Desk Nine. The file on Dallas and Elena can be wiped the same way.
A thin man in a clean collar appears in the tavern mirror by the bar, not inside the room, just reflected there for a blink. He is already turning away, as if he came to confirm one thing, the evidence is here.
Elena Vane
Take the files. Now. If they lose them, they lose their leverage. If they keep them here, they lose us.
Jackson shifts aside to clear the exit while the sedan’s door opens in the rain.